Revenue: £68.9m (-18%)
Headcount: 340
This Cheshire-based comms specialist combined recent acquisitions Foursys, Armadillo Sec and Cyberlab Consulting under the ‘CyberLab’ brand in October 2023 as it bids to become a “cyber security powerhouse”. Revenues for Chess’ year to 30 April 2022 contracted 18% to £68.9m following its decision to jettison two low-margin businesses in 2020 and 2021 (stripping these out, revenues fell 3%). Gross margins increased from 35.4% to 36.7%.
Oxygen ice-breaker: Having moved to a “home first” policy, 96% of Chess’ staff work from home.
